Bare-Handed
Unclothed by night and by noon hour, bare
among strangers, on the street, either in
or out of the bath, in the rain, the hands
go around naked as faces, but unlike
The Face they conceal nothing—unless
they’ve got something to hide, a trick
up the sleeve, a palmed card in a game
of high stakes, that dark close-up
magic that’s got you under its spell.
You know what I mean—the fake cut,
the double turnover, the fake over-
hand shuffle. Unlike breasts, thighs,
often elbows, they go usually naked,
unless shaping snowballs, boxing,
or washing dishes in latex gloves.
And they don’t give a fig or a flip.
One feeling for trouble, the other
cradling the defeated head, one thieving
hand in the cookie jar, the other signing
on the line it should not sign onto,
grasping at straws, throwing it all
to the wind. Some days they’ve got
the whole mad body dancing
the overhand shuffle. Those bare-
naked hands, trickster hands.
Tuesdays, neither’s sure what the other
is up to, Thursdays—some good,
some evil, all knowledge and
dumb as flesh. Always, one hand
striving to remake the world,
the other grabbing what it doesn’t own.